Turner [Police Chief George Turner] said he couldn't explain the recent spurt of gun crimes that has taken place throughout the city and county.

"There are just a lot of violent people out there who don't care about the lives and liberties of others," he said.

I wonder if he could be referring to another kind of "liberty" than the one the pro-gun crowd is always talking about. This sounds more like the liberty of not living in a society where guns are so available, where the pro-gun folks keep preaching that more guns is the answer, now fewer. I think that's the kind of liberty the police chief is talking about.

I know that it's easy to focus on the gun as the problem of human violence. It's easy because it gives us a sense that we can solve the problem, if only we ban a thing. The truth is, humans have been harming each other since the being.

"The moment God crapped out the third caveman a conspiracy was hatched against one of them!"- Hunter Gathers

I think it's reasonable to say, that you you are not anti gun. After all guns are things just as bulldozers are things. It's the violence which you are opposed to. That isn't something we can solve by banning guns as Britain has learned that hard way.

"Stabbings are the most common form of murder in Britain, where firearms — except certain shotguns and sporting rifles — are outlawed.

Of the 839 homicides in England and Wales in 2005, 29% involved sharp instruments including knives, blades and swords. Firearms account for just 9% of murders in Britain. The murder rate in Britain is 15 per million people"

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stabbing

We've seen that in the absence of guns, people still find ways to harm each other.

In Africa the machete is often used where people can't get guns.

I'd like to propose a truce of sorts.I think I am as against violence as you are. So rather than invest our energies in arguing over the mechanisms that violence uses, lets join our efforts together to fight violence as a whole.

It's easy enough to prove, Weerd, but I have no illusions that you'll consider the facts.

There are fewer than 300 justifiable homicides (from all causes) in the US annually. We all know that there many times this number of gun murders.

Those are hard facts--each dead body has a story behind it. Either it was a justifiable homicide or it wasn't.

But what about brandishing a gun?

Well, your claims of DGUs where the gun is merely brandished are wholly subjective. And the same is true of when guns are brandished for the purpose of harrassment, intimidation or threats. There are studies purporting to support both sides. But plain sense indicates that since there are about 250 justifiable homicides each year (about 85% gun-related) and that there are about 13000 gun homicides each year indicates guns are usually brought to bear for illegal purposes.

Another factoid: the number of justifiable homicides by gun are slightly less than the number of children killed each year in gun accidents.

Chris' comment is disingenuous; he seems to be saying that if people didn't have guns, they'd find other means to kill.

Of course, this ignores the fact a gun greatly enhances the ability to kill. This means someone who is predisposed to kill will probably act on his inclination knowing a gun may well help him get away with it. Additionally, a gun allows someone to kill without having to get that close to a prospective victim and may allow the killer to kill from a place of concealment.

Look, there's a reason why we send our troops into combat with firearms not machetes or bulldozers.

I'd like to move past this perpetual debate about guns and strike in to the root of violence in society. Rather than entrench ourselves based on our differences, I would like to reach out and try to corporate based on our agreements.TO me focusing on guns is like debating vigorously the shape of the table we should sit at for an armistice agreement. It's futile waste of effort and only serve to prolong and exacerbate the real problem.

In Rwanda, the armies were armed with machetes. Maybe it slowed the genocide there, but certainly it didn't prevent it.

I'd paraphrasing Charl van Wyk, in that when both sides of a conflict are armed, we call it a war, but when only one side is armed, we call it a genocide.

I'm not saying that I think that people without guns will find other ways to kill. I'm saying that the historical and objective evidence is overwhelming that this is so.

Guns are not the root of crime or violence, anymore than cars are the root of drunk driving.

Jade: “Not many. Especially when compared to the numbers of lives lost or broken due to misuse of guns.”

I readdress this with you again. First of all, how many of these innocent people who defended themselves do you have to disarm to prevent one criminal from getting a gun and murdering someone? How many Jade?

Secondly, who are you to play God? Even if you make the big assumption that disarming people will save net lives (which you are yet to prove without selectively dismissing data that doesn’t agree with your position), you are still saying that some people should die so that others (more?) will live. The basis of the gun control argument is morally flawed even if every theory they have actually worked.

Well done, Jade. You've completely ignored the following possibilites:Situations where the gun was presented and not fired (estimated at 2.5 million times per year by Kleck).Situations where the gun was presented and fired, but no one was hit (also included).Situations where the gun was fired and someone was hit, but not killed.

Instead, you focused on justifiable homicides (probably handgun only, not including rifle or shotguns, since your number was so small, but we'll never know since you didn't provide us with anything to source).

As to whether or not this is subjective, we have to admit that you cannot prove something that didn't happen. So, if someone pulls a gun and doesn't fire it, and the criminal runs away rather than face an armed victim, of course there is no account of it, because the crime didn't happen.

Chris, I'd like to point out that it's not an either/or deal. Gun control folks are not saying focus on the gun and NOT on the violence. We say along with the many initiatives aimed at the root causes of violence, let's also limit the availability of guns to those who are most likely to abuse them. The flow of guns from the law abiding to the criminals can and should be diminished. Meantime let's indeed focus on the root causes of poverty, drugs, unemployment, mental illness, addictions, etc.

About the substitution of knife for gun, I agree with Jadegold, you sound disingenuous.

One of the huge myths about the Rwandan genocide is that it was prosecuted with nothing but clubs and machetes. This, gunloons tell us, shows that horrible tragedies occur without the presence of guns.

Of course, this is largely myth, revisionism and outright fabrication.

Certainly the world was shocked to see images coming from Rwanda where civilians were hacked and/or beaten to death. But what is missing is the fact Hutu militias were equipped with guns and grenades and were able to corral numbers of Tutsis where they were hacked or beaten--in some cases, they were compelled to kill one another.

IOW, once a group of Tutsis were detained--with guns--the Hutus were free to use machetes and clubs.

I'd like to move past this perpetual debate about guns and strike in to the root of violence in society. Rather than entrench ourselves based on our differences, I would like to reach out and try to corporate based on our agreements.

I appreciate your attention to historical accuracy. You should also note that the Tutsis had been legally disarmed buy the UN, and so had no ability to resit being corralled and hacked to death by the Hutu militias, which ignored the disarmament agreement.

As important as the sad case of Rwanda is, my point isn't that gun are not used in violence. It's that guns are not a necessary causal factor of violence, and so focusing on them isn't really a solution to the problem.

I'm sure that you wouldn't argue that had Rwanda been actually gun free, it was after all technically a gun free zone, the genocide wouldn't have happened.

Two things before we keep going. One is that I am still interested in why you think I am being disingenuous?

Chris, It's the substitution of knife for gun that I don't buy, and I don't think you do either. Guns are more efficient and lethal. Remove them and the damage, in spite of what Mr. Anonymous says, is less. To me that's common sense.

It's not a question of whether you can accomplish killing someone without a gun. It's a question of which tool is more likely to succeed.

As Ruff ruder suggested... We have a very wide and diverse sample of countries and cities which have agreed with you and implemented policies to reduce violence by limiting or banning civilian gun ownership.

Places like Mexico, Australia, Jamaica, Britain ect... A social scientist couldn't ask for a better sample from which to test their hypothesis.

So given such a wide and diverse sample. What examples validate your hypothesis?

Chris, For that argument to work for the pro-gun side, you need to do both cherry picking of data and you need to compare apples and oranges.

The cultural differences between Japan and the States with regards suicide is one example and everyone knows those Brits are violent brutes compared to your average Yank. That's a silly joke - the point is there are too many other factors to compare.

Better examples are right here in America. All those stats related to the high gun states vs. the low gun states work for me. Here's one that I like.

We've seen other surveys that contradict that higher-violent-crime-after-gun-bans theory. We've also seen descriptions of the transition from lethal shootings to non-lethal stabbings. There were also reports of the different ways crime is reported in the UK and how that's changed over the years.